Its #LightUpLive tonight in #yyc.

I’ve worked in the entertainment and events industries for my entire adult life. I am formerly an actor, and have spent the past 12+ years as one of the primary photographers to the performing arts in Calgary. This includes concerts, dance shows, beer/wine/cannabis industry events, the children’s festival, film festivals, tv commercials, and of course, the theatre. But all that is on pause, and has already been for seven months. And for seven months I’ve been scraping by trying to find the next closest thing to work on in the interim. Its been brutal.

Before the shutdown, I was covering up to a third of all professional performing arts in Calgary PLUS creating ads and headshots for the same community. There is no return in sight at this time. Concerts, performances, and events are all largely cancelled or pending at best. I’ve considered myself extremely fortunate that a little bit of freelance work has appeared elsewhere, but it’s been far from enough. I still worry daily about how long I’ll be able to keep my studio open.

I’ve also watched as my friends in the industry have rallied together to fight for financial support, fight for their careers in the face of being called LAZY ARTISTS and drains on the system by the shrill conservative government and their sycophants. These are the people that already live day in and day out on the poverty line because that’s where society has deemed they should live anyway. Now that the tenuous support system that existed for them is gone completely, the scramble to find something - ANYTHING - to support themselves is ever-present.

If you don’t think the arts deserve your support, a meager percentage of a percentage of the annual government budget in order to continue to survive, well, that’s on you. But honestly, fuck you for thinking so.

If you think that artists deserve to be cast aside to rot during this pandemic because they are deemed UNNECESSARY WORKERS... consider a post-Covid world where there are NO CONCERTS, NO DANCEHALLS, NO WEDDING VENUES, NO CORPORATE XMAS PARTIES, and NO MOVIES OR TV because all of the production staff, those workers dressed all in black that you sometimes see buzzing around in the background, have all had to move on to other work just to survive...

That’s what you’re asking these people to accept: That you’d rather they all ceased to exist and their labours should be without worth.

I, for one, think that’s bullshit.